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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27519088">A Proposition</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/firelord65/pseuds/firelord65'>firelord65</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Tales from the Pit [16]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Divergent (Movies), Divergent Series - Veronica Roth</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Marriage Proposal, Mentioned Christina/Four, shortfic</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2017-11-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2017-11-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-08 05:08:13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,058</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27519088</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/firelord65/pseuds/firelord65</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Eric proposes to Tris in an unusual way.<br/>Prompt fic</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Eric/Tris Prior</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Tales from the Pit [16]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2011174</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A Proposition</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Anonymous prompted: Eric proposes to Tris in an unusual way!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Did you hear the news?” If I could erase a question from existence, I think that today I would obliterate that one. It’s just vague enough that the first time you hear it, you have to think and wonder, <em> did I? </em> The fourth or fifth time that someone asked, you just wished that they were fucking straightforward and asked what they so clearly wanted to.</p><p>The smile that I plastered on my face is just blithe enough that maybe someone wouldn’t mistake me for mentally sharpening knives. “I heard about Four and Christina, if that’s what you mean,” I breathed. Patty nodded earnestly with that relieved-but-a-little-disappointed look. She had been <em> so </em> ready to be the one to break the news that my ex and my friend were now engaged.</p><p>God, all that I had wanted was to get a good cup of coffee before my evening shift monitoring the motorpool. At least there… well even there I probably wouldn’t be able to escape the rumor mill. The trucks just make people shout in order to gossip.</p><p>“How does that feel? I mean, they-” Patty started to launch into inquisition mode. Oh no, no.</p><p>I cleared my throat and tipped my head. “They’re happy with each other. Christina had actually mentioned thinking he was going to pop the question before winter got underway. So I was already expecting it,” I said.</p><p>Patty’s eyebrows leapt into the stratosphere, but thankfully by then she’d filled my thermos. I gave her a quick farewell and swept out of the shop. She was a great person to talk to about emotional problems. I just didn’t want to put the energy into caring. That would just validate all the knowing glances and questions that people were peppering me with.</p><p>I was right about the motorpool being just as annoying as the rest of the compound. Richards wasn’t even on tonight in either department, so I didn’t even have my usual buffer. At least I could shut myself into the office and sulk with my coffee. There my only interactions were when mechanics slapped forms into the inbox and drivers chucked keys into the bins.</p><p>I perked up when a much more welcomed face popped up in the diamond-webbed glass of the office door. Eric sometimes came down during the “lunch break” lull of the night shift, if he was conscious enough to navigate the walkways. He had a bagel - toasted <em> and </em> with the good cream cheese - and a kiss on the cheek for me.</p><p>“There weren’t any of the monterey jack ones, but Jesse gave you the cream cheese on the house,” he murmured as he sank into a folding chair. I’d made a deal to swap it with a small filing cabinet that made more sense to be in the mechanics’ nook anyway.</p><p>“The kiss from Jesse, too?” I teased. Joking aside, I was starving. I tore open the foil wrapper and scarfed down the top half as quickly as I could chew.</p><p>Eric laughed and rested his head on his knuckles. He was barely keeping his eyes open, the poor guy. “You should be upstairs asleep,” I said with a mouth full of bagel.</p><p>“Soon,” he grunted. “Wanted to check in on you.”</p><p>“I’m fine. Hungry and waiting for Wednesday,” I insisted. I was slowing down with my eating now, hunting for my thermos again to wet my throat.</p><p>Eric grunted in assent. Our days off lined up, which made up for the utter frustration of our shifts <em> not </em>. Not that Eric truly got days off, even. I was afforded that luxury while I waited for the next round of Leadership training to kick off. Till then I bided my time with lower level management. It suited me.</p><p>“What do you want to do then?” I asked. “We talked about grabbing a truck out for a change on scenery and then never did it.”</p><p>“Don’t care. You should pick though. You’re gonna be so annoyed by then,” he said. Of course he’d heard the news, too.</p><p>I crumbled up the foil and slammed it into the waste bin next to the desk just to have something to do. “I’m already annoyed and it’s been like a <em> day </em>,” I growled.</p><p>Eric peeled open one eye and squinted at me. “People being dicks?” he asked.</p><p>“People being dicks,” I echoed. “Everybody’s just like ‘oh Tris, did you hear? What’s that like? Are you invited?’ Like, hell if I even care. I <em> don’t </em>,” I insisted when he opened his other eye to give me a look. “I don’t.”</p><p>Exhaling slowly, Eric stretched languidly. “I mean, I know you don’t care about the invitation crap, but we both know you care a little bit that she’s marrying <em> him </em>,” he reasoned.</p><p>I glared at the ceiling rather than voice my protest. Eric was right, of course. “They’ve only been together, what, eight months?” I said.</p><p>“Something like that.”</p><p>We sat in silence for several minutes. I drank my coffee. Eric alternated between poking through the outbox of forms - he’d take them with him if he was stopping by his office before bed - and doodling on my sticky notes.</p><p>“We could do it, you know,” he muttered. I looked at him over my thermos. Eric met my eyes and said, “Get married.”</p><p>“Married.” I chewed on my lip, hating the gravity that the word held. We’d never really spoken about it, not directly. He’d laugh about how his parents wouldn’t go to a traitor’s wedding. I sometimes praised Dauntless for not requiring it before people lived together. Neither of us ever said whether we thought we needed it.</p><p>Eric leaned forward and tapped my knee. “Wouldn’t that get his goat? Cause you know they’re gonna go traditional. Take months to plan. Have an actual invite list and requisition flowers,” he mused.</p><p>My heart didn’t flutter, but I felt my stomach lurch. He was asking. Eric was actually asking.</p><p>“D’you wanna get married to spite them?”</p><p>I felt my mouth widen into an uncontrolled grin. My hand clasped over my heart. “Do I want to be a complete dick and take away from their fairytale engagement? By marrying the guy that both of ‘em hate but have to put up with if they want to pretend to be as righteous as they claim?” I asked. “Of course I do.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Previously a part of the "Tales from the Pit" compilation fic on my profile. Moving all of these to their own pieces in a series instead so they can be more accurately tagged on their own.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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